"The Biggest Mistake in My Life"

Dr. Erwin Thoma:"In one of my talks, a gentleman stood up and told the audience in his own words about the biggest mistake he ever made:

'I am working in the building and real estate industry and a few years ago, I built a house for my wife and me. This house had external wood cladding which was painted with some wood preservatives as was usual then. Two years later, my wife gave birth to our first child which is now physically and mentally disabled. We never tried to prove a connection between the wood treatment and the disability of our child; it couldn't make our child healthy either. However I do know now that treating the external cladding of our house was the biggest mistake I ever made.'"

Why Toxic Wood is a Concern

Synthetic paints, chemical treatments and large-scale wood lamination turn wood into a mix of different materials and compounds. Their effect upon humans is mostly unknown and it is impossible for the average consumer to correctly gauge the risk they are taking with these products.

Why does the wood industry produce and install toxic building materials? Are authorities informed, not guilty or just plain negligent? Are chemicals really that bad?

Here is an excerpt from the 'Salzburger Nachrichten' back in the year 1993:

"Wood preservatives, two parole sentences"

Frankfurt Main (SN, APA). On Tuesday the Frankfurt "Wood Preservative Trial" sentenced both accused men to one year suspended prison term each and a total fine of 1.7 million Schillings, payable to several joint plaintiffs.The executive directors of the company XYZ, 64 year old XY and 62 XY were both sentenced guilty of negligent bodily harm, concomitance, the negligent release of toxins and selling toxic goods while being well aware of the danger they are posing."

Please, allow me now to tell you about my own personal motivation and why our family started taking toxic chemicals seriously.

After six years of living in the Tyrolean Alps in an old Timber cabin, we moved back to our home town in the area called 'Salzburger Land'. The cabin had been built of solid and untreated timber and the house accommodating us now was about 30 years old. It was built at a time when the words 'toxic' and 'building materials' were not yet combined.

Nobody was suspecting that building materials were going to cause serious harm to anyone's health. Our family was perfectly healthy until suddenly two of our children started coughing and having breathing difficulties.

First without fever, later with a slight temperature rise, followed by asthma attacks, fear of going to sleep and cries for help at night: "Mama, Papa, why can't I breathe anymore?" The first doctor didn't have a diagnosis but prescribed a dose of penicillin. The next doctor didn't have any idea either as to why this condition was persisting. He prescribed cortisone for our children and elaborated in their presence, how they would have to carry a puffer with them for the rest of their lives.

We needed a third doctor before we realized we couldn't expect any help from conventional medicine in this matter. This third doctor tested for allergies. Holding our boy's arm he exclaimed: "Oh my God, this boy is allergic to just about everything!" 

He listed a selection of native trees and grasses. Strangely, I am a forester and I have taken my son at pre-school age on many walks and tracks throughout the seasons and blooming times of the year, day and night, in and out of the forest and never found him to be overly sensitive to anything.

Our commonsense told us that those medical reckonings couldn't be correct. Our children grew up in the Alps with goats, chickens, dogs and cats. There were no allergies or any other symptoms. Our son in particular spent a fair amount of time in the company of our Billy goat.

Apart from the goatish scent, we never noticed anything having a negative impact on him. The health symptoms had appeared just after we moved into our new house. We thought maybe something in our new environment was having this effect on our children's quality of life.

When looking closer at our new surroundings, we soon realized the house was playing a big part. The brick work was not insulated and therefore there were no dust or microfibers from mineral wool or emissions from plastic insulation. The wood cladding was not treated either and we ruled that out as a possible cause as well.

However, the floors were a different story all together. All the rooms had particle-board floors covered with carpets and vinyl. Particle boards are nothing more than wood shavings mixed with synthetic glues and pressed into boards. 

After realizing this might be the possible source of our troubles, we removed all chip and particle boards as fast as we could and replaced it with untreated and solid wooden boards from native trees like oak, ash and larch. There is no toxic wood in our house anymore.

Shortly thereafter, our children were back to their normal healthy selves. What a relief! Like the man who made the biggest mistake. We too couldn't find a 'scientific diagnosis' for the disease of our children. The most important thing for us was the result: Our children have their health back.

​I remember the times when he was ill in bed and I told him that every illness has a reason and how faith can move mountains. We all believed strongly that one day he would be running again like a deer in the forest.

The question: "Mama, why can't I breathe anymore?" cannot stay unanswered.

Just think about how it could have ended if we had taken the advice of any of the doctors, if we were prepared to settle for an asthma puffer and not changed the floors of our home at all! Just now, while I am writing these lines, our eldest son has come home from school and told us that he was the fastest runner today.